


Aftermath

by LtLJ



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Plot What Plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-12-18
Updated: 2005-12-18
Packaged: 2017-10-02 20:29:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,174
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LtLJ/pseuds/LtLJ
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A Plot What Plot? tag at the end of The Storm-The Eye episodes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Aftermath

John walked out through the back of the lab, to the small bay that extended out over the water. It might have been meant to be some kind of observatory; one wall was transparent, with a waist-high bronze shelf running along it. The environmental controls still weren't working and the little room was freezing.

John leaned on the shelf and the lights responded to his half-formed thought, dimming to reduce the glare on the glass, so the room was lit only by the fading gray sky. He looked out at the pewter sea, still tossed by the storm's fitful remnants. They weren't more than a hundred yards above the water here, and he could hear the waves. And smell the wind, damp and fresh and sharply electric from the storm; there must be an outside air intake. A deep breath eased the pounding in his head.

Rodney walked in behind him and huffed in annoyance. "I reiterate, you should get some sleep. You're dead on your feet, I'm traumatized, everybody's home, the city is safe--"

"You could fuck me," John said, then thought, _wow, that came out of nowhere._

Rodney was silent for a long moment. Then he said, "Um, seriously?"

John thought about it. "Yeah."

Rodney stepped up behind him, close enough for John to feel his body heat. John willed the door behind them to slide shut, and heard the faint hiss as it sealed itself. "Okay," Rodney muttered. He laid a hand on John's hip, kept it there when John twitched involuntarily at the contact, fever-warm even through fabric. "Easy, easy," Rodney whispered, as if he was soothing a startled animal, and slid the hand up under John's shirt and jacket, up his back.

John was cold and so tense his body felt brittle, and Rodney's hand was pure heat on his skin. He let his head rest against the glass, breathing out. Rodney drew his fingers down, hesitating as he found the faint ridge of an old scar, then he pulled away. "I just, there's this, um."

"Uh," John said, his mind suddenly blank, wondering if that was Rodney-speak for "this is a bad idea." And it was a bad idea, but they were in another galaxy, and it had been so long since anyone had touched him in a non-medical, non-sparring, non-tackling-out-of-path-of-Wraith-stunner-or-culling-beam way.

But Rodney was saying, "I know this is post-traumatic stress, but there was threatening, and knives, and the possibility of being thrown off balconies that were very high. And everything here wants to kill us." He was reaching around, carefully unfastening John's gunbelt, as if trying not to let his hand stray anywhere else. Then John's breath caught as Rodney reached between his legs from behind, letting his hand drift up the inside of John's thigh, finding and opening the two clips for the holster strap. Rodney pulled the belt free, then slid his hand back up, smoothing the fabric, firm pressure up and up and right _there_, and John made a faint startled noise in his throat and twitched again, bonking his head against the cold window, then it was gone.

Rodney put the belt and holstered pistol on the shelf within easy reach, and John felt the atavistic panic that had started to build in his chest die away. When Rodney lifted the headset off John's ear, John actually shivered; it felt like the most intimate thing anyone had ever done to him with his pants still on. John knew he had officially been in Atlantis too long, when someone taking off his gun and radio was this intense act of rendering him vulnerable as a prelude to sex. If Rodney made a crack about John's reaction to it, John was going to have to kill him. But Rodney's breath was rough in John's ear, suggesting he wasn't exactly unmoved either, and he asked, "How long-- How long has it been since you--"

"With a woman or a man?" John asked, watching his breath mist on the glass.

"Either."

"Um." John blinked, realizing it was long enough that he had to think about it. "Before Antarctica."

"Oh my God." Rodney sounded appalled. "Just a second."

He moved away and John turned to watch him rummage in one of the crates stacked against the wall. Rodney muttered, "There's supplies-- This is something of a spot for-- And-- Okay, fine."

Before John could get his mind around the fact that the science team actually had condoms and lube stored in the lab 4 observatory and everybody in the city really was having sex except him, Rodney was back. His hands were on John's hips, unbuckling his belt, pushing his clothes down. It should have been awkward, but Rodney handled him the way he handled a piece of ten thousand year old Ancient tech that might save their lives: firm and sure and gentle and precise all at once. He kept up a soft monologue of coaxing and exclamations in John's ear, one big warm hand pressed against John's abdomen to hold him still, until John's tense body surrendered and opened for him.

Rodney didn't tease, either. John came in his hand and braced against the window, still coasting down, trying not to collapse so Rodney could finish. Then Rodney threaded a hand through his hair, tugging his head back, and said, "God, you're beautiful." John growled in his throat and Rodney went over the edge with a gasp and a hard shudder.

They were holding each other up, leaning on the window, and it shouldn't have been that good for cold exhausted post-traumatic stress sex. Then Atlantis' comm system said, "This is Weir. Major Sheppard, can you call in, please?"

Rodney yelped and John swore, and there was a mad scramble to get away from each other. John yanked his pants up and fumbled his headset back on. Rodney was trying to get his pants fastened while making gestures indicating that he was having some kind of medical emergency. "Rodney, Rodney, take it easy! They can't see us through the radio."

"I'm having a heart attack!" Rodney snarled through gritted teeth.

"Have it quietly!" John snapped. He took a breath, keyed the radio, and said evenly, "Elizabeth, this is Sheppard."

"Oh, there you are. Sorry to bother you after I told you to go off-duty, but Sergeant Bates has some security questions that apparently can't wait." With a tired chuckle, she added, "I called your quarters and got a little worried when you didn't respond. It's been that kind of day, to put it mildly."

She sounded exhausted and had probably had visions of him lying dead in a corridor somewhere when he hadn't answered the page. It had been exactly that kind of day. "No problem, I just took my headset off. I'm down in the labs. I was waiting for McKay to finish--" He couldn't help lifting a brow at Rodney, who, frantically buckling his belt, grimaced and mouthed the words "Oh, very funny," "--doing something. I'll be up there in a minute."

  
**end**

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Aftermath (podfic)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/246711) by [susan_voight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/susan_voight/pseuds/susan_voight)




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